anrique

It must be 35 years since I first read this book, and it is no less powerful the second time. It recounts a day in the life of Ivan Denisovich Shukhov, a prisoner in one of Stalin’s slave-labor camps in Siberia. It is an almost minute-by-minute account, from the time Shukhov first opens his eyes in his upper bunk to when he finally lies down again late at night. In between are hours of labor in the brutal Siberian winter, where a temperature of -27 Fahrenheit is not cold enough to keep the prisoners in for the day. Much of Shulkov’s thoughts and schemes revolve around food: how to hide part of his morning bread ration to eat at night, how to get a portion of the extra bowls of gruel that he snares for his work group, how to befriend a fellow prisoner so he can share in a piece of sausage from a parcel the man has received from home. The book reveals the tensions, backbiting but also the bedrock camaraderie that binds prisoners in the work group together, their affection for the foreman, a fellow zek who has tremendous influence on work assignments and food allocations, their shared hatred for guards or others who make their lives miserable. For Shukhov there is no dream of eventual liberty here, what concerns him every waking minute are food, survival and maintaining a shred of human dignity under conditions of unimaginable cruelty and privation. The political commentary is all the more devastating for its understatement. What did Zhukov do to merit his 10-year sentence? He and a fellow soldier escaped from German captivity during World War II, and when they made it back to Russian lines they were promptly arrested and judged to be spies: in the view of Stalin and his minions, what else could explain the fact that captured soldiers managed to return to their own army? No one can fully understand the barbarism and inhumanity of 20th century totalitarianism, and at the same time the unquenchable human struggle for freedom, without reading this masterpiece. Efrem Sigel, 4/1/09, www.efremsigel.com

2022-11-14 16:51